Today's Scripture Reading (August 21, 2026): Jeremiah 24
A Japanese proverb says that "we learn
little from victory, much from defeat." If it were not for the defeats in
life, we would not grow in any of the areas of our lives. Our growth, to a
great degree, depends on the challenges that we face, and our challenges often
stem from the losses we suffer in life. Challenges and defeats help us to fine-tune
our behavior, and they help us to identify bad behavioral strategies. All of
this happens, that is, as long as we admit that we have been defeated.
Our various defeats are part of a plan that
God uses to strengthen his people. As Jeremiah watches the first two groups of
the people be carried into exile, God stresses that the purpose of the
Babylonian Captivity was not to destroy Israel; it was to protect them. In the
end, they would come back stronger. It wasn't the first time that God had used
the strategy. Back at the very beginning of the nation, Israel was faced with
the challenge of being absorbed by the much larger and stronger Canaanite
nations. God's plan then involved sending this family into a self-imposed exile
in Egypt. There the nation would grow and mature, and at the same time be
isolated in a group with an opportunity to bond together into a national unit.
The result was that 400 years later, Israel had become a nation that was
capable of holding their own in Canaan, even if they doubted that fact
themselves. It is into this situation that Moses steps to lead Israel into
their future.
In Jeremiah's day, the nation was under threat
once more. This time, they were about to be swallowed up by a wave of idolatry.
As a result of the idolatry, God decided to repeat the strategy one more time.
He took the best and brightest and allowed them to be taken into Babylon.
There, God promised to protect them. Meanwhile, Jerusalem and the surrounding
area would be cleansed. The seed that was the future of Israel would be
protected until the time came for the nation to be planted once again in the
Promised Land.
The problem, from the point of view of Israel,
was that it felt like the biggest failure the nation had ever suffered, not a
moment in which God was in control, or a moment that was to become the stepping-off
point into the nation's future. Just as when Israel was in Egypt and the time
came to raise up Moses and Aaron, God had plans, at the appropriate time, to
raise up leaders like Ezra, Nehemiah, and Zerubbabel among other leaders who
were capable of leading the nation back home one more time.
Tomorrow's
Scripture Reading: Jeremiah 25
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